User-operated heavy equipment, such as that found in construction, farming, industry, and the military, typically includes at least one control grip that is used by the operator to move and control the equipment. The grip operates similarly to a joy stick but is larger, and the operator uses one of his hands to move the grip and press buttons and switches on the grip in order to control the equipment. Often, the operator has to have his hand on the grip for long periods of time while using the grip to control the equipment. Therefore, some grips include rests or supports upon which the operator can rest his hand while still also keeping his hand on the grip.
One type of conventional grip rest is formed integrally with the grip near the bottom of the grip and is stationary with respect to the grip. The rest is a portion that flares out generally perpendicularly from the grip and may be contoured to receive the bottom portion of a hand. Such “one size fits all” rests, however, do not accommodate all operator hand sizes and shapes. For example, depending on the size of an operator's hands, such rests may be positioned too low along the body of the grip for the operator's hand to be able to engage all of the buttons positioned near the top of the grip while still lying on top of the rest. In such a case, the rest does not provide any support to the user's hand while the user's hand is operating the grip. Therefore, the user has to move his hand between the rest and the buttons on the grip during operation, which can lead to fatigue, reduced productivity, and/or injury.
There are also conventional adjustable grip rests that can be moved with respect to the body of the grip. Such adjustable grip rests, however, require multiple hands, special equipment, and even multiple operators to adjust the rests. Therefore, such rests cannot quickly or easily be adjusted by one operator and require work stoppages so that the operator(s) can adjust the position of the grip rest. Because so much effort is involved in adjusting the rests, new users may not take the time to adjust the rests from the position they were set at by a previous user or only a specific individual may be allowed to operate the grip so that time is not spent on adjusting the hand rest for a different user.